In a flash of light the man in the royal clothing appears again. "We have a winner folks, and not only that we have a new champion of this drome. that means right now this player is the top dog, the cream of the crop of this drome, he now has the right to refuse one challenge and if there are no other matches announced to challenge one person of his choosing at any time, if you topple him from his post you also gain these rights, now until the next match stay golden" The forest resets itself as the body of the fallen disappears into the endless stream of ones and zeros. The player and the announcer disappear back to the observation dome to await the next match.

The wind flitted through the branches of the trees high overhead, so peaceful that one would perhaps never guess that a battle had only just taken place in that tranquil wood... or that another one was about to begin. But, now, perhaps, mused the figure in green, was not the best time to be feeling sentimental. Brushing a few strands of his bright orange hair from his face, his golden eyes began to pan casually across the environment around him. The breeze blew once again, sending his tattered green cloak fluttering about him like some sort of concealing cloud. Idly, he raised his bare arm as the wind ceased to blow, brushing back the mantle over his shoulders so as not to hinder his own movements with it later, exposing the light scale and plate mail he wore beneath it. Bumping his fist against the armor, he smiled at the satisfying clack it gave in response.

Well, Borogove supposed, he should probably start looking for his enemy. His eyes panned further across the green, and stopped abruptly. That had been a remarkably simple task, actually, as it seemed his enemy was a large stone colossus about the size of a large house. Not too difficult to spot, really, although perhaps the creature hadn't yet seen him. His outfit, done in tones of grey and green, blended in fairly well with the trees between him and the enemy. He smirked. Well, then, since all the necessary formalities had been completed - the arrival of both combatants - he supposed there was no need to delay any longer. Might as well use the time he had at his disposal while he had yet to be seen by his enemy to prepare himself.

He closed his eyes for a moment, and lowered his hand, turning it palm downward and opening it as though preparing to grasp some unseen object. Already, in his mind, thoughts were being cast aside as his consciousness focused on a single image, and a single image alone. For a moment, he simply stood, concentrating on his work and the picture he held in his mind. He corrected every flaw, until the weapon he had imagined was as perfect as he could make it on short notice. Having spent a full minute or so on its creation, he was confident that it would be suitably powerful. He opened his eyes, and smiled. Now that he had a power to work with, all that was left to do was to modify it while he waited for his enemy to do something. He wasn't one to make the first move, much preferring to know the strengths and weaknesses of the enemy he was faced with before he did anything rash. In the meantime, that gave him time to prepare...

"The Apocalypse is basically just a tutorial." - Sicon112.

"Due to the ambiguity of this wording, I am unable to determine whether or not I am the leader of the X-Men!" "UNIVERSE-BREAKING EPILEPSY RAVE!" - AMimsyBorogove

Goliath looked around - Well, where could be my first oponent? Probably it's a small one. He must be trying to blend in the fores-There she is. Or he. Doesn't matter. - Goliath stared down the humanoid at eleven o'clock - Small. That was expected. Wait, she is doing something. - He watched his enemy to kneel down in the ground - Would she be giving up? Only by seeing me? No... She is doing something... She has an weapon! I see... Whomever she is, she is a great smither. Hephaestus would be proud of this one. She may be an worthy oponent, if her weapon seems as great as her power and if she can use them.

Goliath started walking towards Borogove, with his arms open, as if he was about to hug her. But he was actually collecting trees. He stopped after a few steps, but with his size the distance between he and his oponent was cut in half. He know had about ten trees in each hand, looking as if he was holding two giant staffs. I suppose speaking at this time won't be much of a problem now, but I could also be... - As Goliath speaks, the earth in front of his feet starts to shape in the form of a nearly perfect spheric boulder, creating a crater where said earth once was - "You're about about to fight me, Goliath. I hope you're an worthy oponent." - And that said, the boulder was finally shaped. It was a small rock (about 1.5 Borogoves), but it was perfectly spherical. Goliath kicked it with his might, sending it towards Borogove, and he also caught the momentum to give one step foward. He now was in battle stance, wielding his trees as if he was wielding two swords, one in each hand.

Dolphins are some of the smartest animals, yes, but by human standards… Let's say you should praise the god that forces them to stay handless and underwater.

Ah. So he's seen me. Fine, then, Borogove thought, watching with interest as the enemy slowly began lumbering towards him, closing the gap while at the same time clearing the area, ripping up several trees and gathering them together, probably for use as weapons. The way Borogove saw it, this titan was probably planning on either throwing them as javelins, or simply trying to crush him beneath their bulk. And, judging by the way he was wielding them, it was probably the latter. The archer sped up his blade creation, completing the weapon itself, a simple, two-edged silvery longsword, and then beginning to add concepts to it. Considering his opponent's weapon of choice, lightning-based elementalization would be largely ineffective. Naturally, fire was his first thought, but, reconsidering this, he realized in an instant that the trees would, obviously, still be very moist, making flames rather limited in their effectiveness. But, then again, that didn't eliminate fire entirely...

Acting hastily, Borogove focused as much as he could and began to add concepts to his weapon. To his surprise, this part of his magic came with remarkable ease, the power it usually took him a moment to muster and concentrate being astonishingly malleable and bending instantly to his will. It must have been the magic of this forest, working in his favor, he supposed. The archer smiled. Perhaps this would be easier than he had thought, then.

First order of business: Weaken the enemy's weapon, strengthen himself.

With a flash of light, the archer set to work, spending all of his remaining time condensing all the power he could into a single, multi-pronged enhancement. By the time the giant had begun to speak, he had finished. A flicker of blue and purple ran down the blade of the sword, and, when the light cleared, the weapon in Borogove's hand had changed its appearance completely, becoming an ornate, dark-colored weapon that seemed to steam as it finished rising up from the ground beneath him. Taking the hilt in his already extended hand, he drew it forth and readied it, casually holding it with a single hand and crossing it over his torso.

The concept he had added was water-element based, and came with two main effects. Firstly, any water near the blade would be passively absorbed, and converted into energy. Given the fact that his enemy seemed to be made entirely of stone, Borogove had a feeling that this wouldn't do anything to "Goliath," as he called himself. However, those trees were another story. If he cut them, given the power of his weapon's creation and conceptual enchantment, he'd probably be able to drain quite a bit of their moisture, making them much more susceptible to a fire attack later. This had the added bonus of giving him more power in the process, power which he could use to either add another concept even more quickly than usual, or to repair the weapon's energy reserves should it become damaged, allowing him to speed things up and get off to a good start.

The weapon's second effect would be similarly useful. Taking control of the water in his body, the blade would reinforce his physical capabilities several times over so long as he held it. The weight of his already fairly light form would be made even lighter, and his strength and speed would be increased greatly. Having seen the enemy's slow pace, he had a sneaking suspicion that speed was just the thing he'd need to win this fight. And, besides, with more strength, he could probably actually withstand at least one or two blows directly blocked without being torn to pieces by the sheer impact, although he had a feeling a direct clash of strength was the last thing he wanted.

Sizing up his opponent with his piercing golden gaze, Borogove watched with interest as the enemy abruptly uprooted a large chunk of earth and began to shape it quickly into a large, round boulder. So, that was his power? To alter the earth? Or perhaps that was only part of a larger ability... either way, perhaps it might be best to counter with an earth enchantment, once he'd seen enough to develop one. But, there wasn't time to think so far ahead. Right now, he needed to keep his mind in the moment. Delivering his introduction and challenge, the giant drew back his leg, then gave the stone a mighty kick, sending it flying at the archer as though it had been fired out of a catapult, while at the same time the enemy dropped into a fighting stance.

In an instant, Borogove sprang into motion, leaping forward and to the side with astonishing speed, the enchantment taking effect from the moment the archer began moving. Clearing the boulder by several meters, Borogove darted forward like a bolt of lightning even as the stone collided with a tree quite some distance beyond him. Bounding forward, he crossed the remaining distance in the blink of an eye, but then abruptly leaped upward into the leafy boughs of a tree, breaking line of sight, and likely dodging a preemptive attack, should the giant have decided to make one. Shooting upward at tremendous speed, Borogove leaped from one branch to the next, within a moment coming almost on a level with the giant's head. As he jumped, he dragged the blade of his sword along the bark of the tree, and smiled as he felt a small surge of power beginning to build up inside the weapon.

He was now about at the same level as his enemy's head. This would be the perfect spot to attack from. Of course, he didn't expect the attack to surprise the giant. Having seen him jump, it had almost undoubtedly become obvious what he intended to do. But, all he wanted to do was force the giant to block the opening stroke. That would just assist him, for already, he was beginning to add a second concept to the blade. And so, leaping out from amongst the branches, he appeared like a green bullet, streaking forward and dealing a diagonal, two-handed slash, aimed for the base of his enemy's neck. He came slightly at an angle, which was no accident. Positioned as he was, the mammoth enemy would still be able to simply raise one of his bundles of tree trunks in the path of the stroke and block it, but his velocity and strength enchantment would make his flight powerful enough that the giant wouldn't be able to simply smash him into the tree and swat him like a fly. No, to truly counterattack, Goliath would need to turn his entire, massive bulk and strike with his second bundle of weapons, which would give the nimble archer time to evade. Just according to his plan.

"The Apocalypse is basically just a tutorial." - Sicon112.

"Due to the ambiguity of this wording, I am unable to determine whether or not I am the leader of the X-Men!" "UNIVERSE-BREAKING EPILEPSY RAVE!" - AMimsyBorogove

Goliath watched as his enemy moved swiftly as the wind, dodging his first attack and moving closer in a blink of an eye, if Goliath blinked. He also noticed that her blade was... Different - Before she could dodge my attack she changed her sword. She truly is a great smither and seems to be a good warrior. This fight will be interesting. - She was getting closer. Knowing those smithers under the guise of Hephaestus, Goliath decided to wait for her attack. She climbed a tree within seconds, and when she was finished, he saw her getting ready for dealing an attack. If Goliath didn't think it would be an waste of his time, he'd have smirked.

Goliath used his power to create tiny boulders close to his feet, about half of Borogove's size. That way, the ground under him slowly filled in with craters, lowering him a few meters. Borogove was now at Goliath's forehead level, and before she could make her attack, he attempted to attack with a swing of his right "sword", in a way it would effectvely block an attack. He also got his left "sword" ready to strike as a club or as a spear, in case he needed to counter or block and attack.

Dolphins are some of the smartest animals, yes, but by human standards… Let's say you should praise the god that forces them to stay handless and underwater.

So he is manipulating the ground... Borogove thought, watching as the enemy sank into a crater of his own making. Considering the method he had used to attack before - kicking the boulder at him - the archer had a feeling, however, that he couldn't actually manipulate his constructs telekinetically. Otherwise, wouldn't he have just fired them upward and forced him to cut off his attempt at an attack? In that case, what was his power? The ability to create boulders? That seemed remarkably specific. Too specific, in fact. Perhaps they had some kind of special property like his own swords? He'd have to be wary of them in the future.

Bringing down his blade, he found it intercepted, as he had expected, by the bundle of uprooted trees wielded by his gigantic enemy, who swung it up to meet him. With a dull crack, the blade met the trees, and, despite its strength, probably should have shattered from the sheer force of the enemy's swing. However, Borogove was no fool. He had seen the stance the enemy had used, and, judging from that as well as his overwhelming strength advantage, predicted that the attack would be a counter rather than a simple defense. Consequently, he had put most of his velocity into moving forward, and, using the puppeteering effect of his own sword as a means of guiding his flight, had taken his leap while turning ever-so-slightly downward. Consequently, by the time the enemy's huge club had swept up through where the archer had been, he had already flipped head over heels, his blade merely grazing along the edge of the attack and guiding it away from himself using its own momentum, rather than actually attempting to thwart it head-on.

Ideally, the archer had hoped to land atop the enemy's back, and to strike once again, but in this attempt, he found himself thwarted. As he had feared, the giant was strong - too strong. The sheer force of his attack, even in passing, left an intense air current in its wake. It was like being caught in a hurricane. The tremendous, whirling shockwave caught him as he flew, blasting him backward and over the head of his enemy, sending him flipping several more times. At this rate, he'd collide with the ground in an out of control crash, and probably break a few of his own bones... Well, then, there was a simple solution to that, now wasn't there?!

Using the energy drained from the many trees he had cut open, as well as from the water in the air, Borogove immediately brought a new concept up to full power on his blade. This concept was grounded in the air element, and, like the attribute already present, had two effects. Firstly, it would coat the blade of the sword, causing the air around it to oscillate at tremendous speeds. This, in turn, would increase its cutting potential greatly, by increasing its energy. At the same time, however, the aura of air would also extend over his own body, to achieve a similar effect to the first concept. Namely, by parting the air around himself, he could move through it without resistance. Then, by using this aura of air thus created, he could encase his body in it, compressing it into a pressure field to slow incoming attacks, while at the same time manipulating it to carry him, using it, like he had used the water concept, to increase his own speed and strength yet further. And, best of all, this ability would even allow him to, with proper exertion, momentarily violate gravity, which was just the thing he needed to break his fall! Flipping abruptly over in mid air, he stopped his descent suddenly just a foot away from the ground, and then slowly touched down, a sort of flickering aura surrounding him. It was transparent, and yet it was clear that the air was condensing and moving, creating an effect similar to the ripples of heat across the ground on a warm summer's day. And, speaking of heat, it was about time he began powering up his next concept. The energy he'd already begun putting into his weapon during his charge hadn't been used up, as he'd bypassed this step completely to activate the wind element using solely energy he'd absorbed. And so, now he concentrated once more, adding the concept of heat to the blade. It wasn't difficult, considering the amount of energy generated by the oscillating air, to add further to the power of the weapon that was swiftly beginning to glow with heat. This had the side effect of magically immunizing the blade to simply melting away, as it otherwise would have thanks to the intense heat of its own vibrating edge, which was, of course, exactly what the archer wanted.

Speaking of archery, he would need to gauge the strength of that giant's armor. Planting the blade in the earth behind him as the concept finished adding itself, he quickly envisioned a bow. Once more, he found the earth beneath him yielding, its innate power helping him shape a decent enough armament of average craftsmanship within a few seconds, a large, black weapon with a mysterious, gleaming texture rising up from the dirt and into his open hand. Once that was done, all he needed was an arrow. Raising the bow, he drew it back, a faint light already taking form between bow and string as he envisioned just such an item. The weapon itself was again, essentially just a normal item. But that wasn't what mattered. Rather, what was important to him was... quantity.

Taking aim in an instant, he took about ten seconds to add the desired concept, but then, not wanting to give the giant time to turn around and close the now fairly sizable distance between them once again, he at last released the string, and fired. His aim was true, and the harmless-looking arrow streaked towards its gigantic target. The archer smiled as the projectile began to glow with a silvery hue, mid-flight. Normally, a strategy like this would be much less effective. But, given the mammoth size of his enemy, it was impossible to miss his shot... even if he was firing a hundred arrows at once!

About halfway to its target, the arrow was completely engulfed with its own luminescence, a light which spread outward in all directions, soon separating from the arrow entirely and forming first a dozen, then a score, then finally at least a hundred identical projectiles - per the archer's added concept to the original weapon, "One of a Hundred," which, due to clever wording, created a hundred identical copies rather than splitting the energy of the single arrow across that entire barrage - all of which streaked towards Goliath like a merciless hailstorm of blades. Given his slowness and massive size, dodging would be an impossibility. And, although he could probably block a few shots with his trees if he managed to actually turn himself around fast enough, he couldn't hope to stop the entire massive cloud that came streaking toward him. But then again, why would he even bother? His armor would surely be able to stop these attacks, and, if not that, his skin would do the job just as well. Of course, he didn't know about the malicious secret of Borogove's weapons, so he wouldn't suspect that by allowing the arrows to strike him and shatter, he would be imprinted with the projectile's energy. And, although one normal arrow, even with the enhancing effects of the magic forest, would only produce a very small blast... a hundred of those at once could combine to form a much more devastating result. Especially considering that Borogove didn't have to spread their destructive power, if they were grafted directly onto his enemy. But, considering the giant's massive size, how could he escape? Borogove supposed he might try raising the earth to protect himself, or bringing his clubs to bear, but it seemed all he could do by this means was to create a ball of varying size, and, given the speed at which an arrow cast by a longbow flew, he couldn't hope to create a large enough shield in time for someone of his own mammoth size to cower behind. And, as the archer already could tell, his clubs wouldn't be able to stop all of the shots. Besides, breaking the blades upon his clubs would just give him the chance to disarm the giant, so he still won in the end, now didn't he? But, in any case, it didn't really matter if the attack damaged the enemy or not. The only purpose of this volley was to gauge his enemy's defenses. In the mean time, he had more important things to worry about. Stepping back, he drew his sword from the earth once again, smiling as he received the moisture absorbed from the ground, and already preparing to shape it into a new concept. But, this time, it was not the sword he modified. Rather, it was the attributes of his bow, slowly increasing its strength and preparing to change its form into a more powerful weapon. He had already seen the maximum speed of his enemy, and, considering that, it had become obvious to him. This battle would most safely be decided by staying out of range and attacking swiftly with arrows that his adversary was too large, and too bulky, to actually dodge properly, while preventing the giant from so much as counter-attacking. It would become a battle of attrition, a test to see who could outlast the other.

If the giant's defenses were truly impenetrable, then he would win. But, to achieve such a victory, he would have to weather ever last blade in the archer's arsenal first. Similarly, if he could catch the archer, he could overpower him. But he would need to catch Borogove first.

"The Apocalypse is basically just a tutorial." - Sicon112.

"Due to the ambiguity of this wording, I am unable to determine whether or not I am the leader of the X-Men!" "UNIVERSE-BREAKING EPILEPSY RAVE!" - AMimsyBorogove

She's good. - He thought, as he started to turn around to face the opponent behind him. Goliath watched she creating a bow and an arrow. He got both of his "swords" ready, one above him and one under him. The tiny boulders under him started to gather in front of him, slowly assembling them, on purpose. She fired an arrow, that quickly turned into hundreds. He watched it - Arrows? Well, rule one of fighting: never underestimate your oponent. A smither like that probably has explosive arrows or another trick with her. So obvious. - If Goliath smirked, he would have, although not in order to insult his enemy, but in order to compliment her, on a way. And now, to counter: Debris Storm ~ Flying Avalanche

Goliath swinged his trees in front of him as the arrows came. Each swing not only created a strong wind, but he also hit each tree at each other, and in the resulting debris. That easily reduced the size of his weapons by one third, but since he was in a forest, there was no problem. he also finished forming the boulder in front of him, and since he started building it slowly, he managed to make it grow quickly at the end, creating a medium sized rock (three Borogoves), and instantly made it become smaller boulders, some bigger, some smaller, but none as big as Borogove.

The arrows either hit the trees or the boulders, while being disrupted by the wind. About five might have hit the tips of his trees, but there's no way Goliath could tell so far. He steped back getting closer to more trees, and slowly and stealthily started shaping a boulder in front of him, taking earth from under him and behind him. He also is in battle stance, ready to attack with both swords, even though she's out of his meele reach.

Dolphins are some of the smartest animals, yes, but by human standards… Let's say you should praise the god that forces them to stay handless and underwater.

Interesting. He defended himself. Does that mean he predicted my attack, or perhaps that his defenses aren't so strong as he'd lead me to believe... Well, there's only one way to find out. With this, Borogove leaped backward, sheathing his longsword at his belt as he landed in several more meters away. The blade's reinforcement still effected the archer, even if it wasn't currently drawn, making it useful even when it wasn't the tool with which he was attacking. In the meantime, he had a new plan. This giant had just made things somewhat inconvenient for him unknowingly, as, due to his defenses, Borogove's runes now lay engraved harmlessly on the rocks, already beginning to disrupt his concentration. While he supposed he could just detonate them, that would be showing part of his hand, and he wouldn't even gain anything from it. But at the same time, he couldn't simply leave them there, serving no purpose. It would have been a worthwhile sacrifice had they been engraved on his enemy directly, but like this, they needed to be disposed of, and in a way that would benefit him. Hmm... he thought he had a suitably good idea. Returning his concentration to his bow, he changed tacks slightly. And, although it didn't seem apparent from a distance, a faint aura of black and crimson began to flicker around the weapon like lightning, an unusual and unnatural power that, due to its nature, could only be seen, but not felt. The power of the void.

As he created an arrow and knocked it to his bow once again, the power of the weapon upon which it was mounted had already begun to alter its nature. The arrow warped, turning black as pitch, its tip growing broad and flashing with a deadly obsidian-hued glint. It became different. It became abnormal. It became unstable. It became the embodiment of a power known only as destruction. It became the embodiment of the void.

Taking aim yet again, Borogove wasted no time. As the giant began stepping back, having at last finished deflecting the last of the arrows, the archer was already springing into action. The string gave a snap as this arrow, too, was released, speeding towards Goliath much faster than the others had done. But still, he had time to execute the same technique as he had done before... Or did he? Borogove lowered his bow, and snapped his fingers twice.

"Bind and Shatter," He declared. At that very instant, the boulders before the arrow, already engraved with numerous runes, flashed to life with a silvery light like the projectiles they had stopped. In an instant, this power coalesced into a gleaming field, one which pressed against the giant stones and sent them flying towards the one who had placed them there. Then, in the next instant, they exploded violently, several fragmenting into countless pieces and spreading a thick, black dust across the space between the archer and his enemy. A tremendous shockwave of rain of debris fell back like a crashing wave atop Goliath, and, pressed for time as he now was, and with his weapons stunted by his own previous defense, he would find himself unable to turn back this shockwave and to use it to deflect the arrow, which emerged a second later from amidst the smoke, streaking right towards the giant's left eye with speed that had only been increased by the energy field through which it had passed, which had accelerated it vastly. It was too high now to be easily turned away by the stone the giant was already creating, but, just in case he did try to pick it up or otherwise raise it, Borogove had already taken measures against him. To his probable surprise, he would find that a similar aura of silvery light was now expanding outward from the branches he held, reaching down to partially encase his wrists. Even with his strength, this field, although it would not bind him, would be enough to slow his movements. And, although he might try to kick the stone upward to deflect the arrow, he would have very little time in which to succeed at this endeavor, and, even if he did manage to save himself, this would only work in the archer's favor.

Void was the element of nothingness, and represented destruction. By placing the power of the void in the bow, he had in turn imbued every shot he now took with that weapon with that same power. This had caused two things. The first was, as one might expect, that this arrow was much more explosive than the others he had fired, and hence much more dangerous. The boulder might shield the giant from even the blast, but, should he take this path, it couldn't hope to protect him fully from the shockwave. Even with his size, he'd be overbalanced, and likely take a step backward to compensate as the shards of the boulder fell atop him and exploded a second time as the rune engraved in them was detonated.

But, at the same time, there was another effect, and it was this power, and not the destructive force of the arrow, upon which Borogove was counting. From the instant he had triggered his runes, he had begun to move, swinging the bow over his back in the same movement as he leaped forward and drew his sword with his free hand. He crossed the distance between himself and the boundary in the blink of an eye, and then... he vanished, for in the wake of the arrow had been left it's second effect: a rift, a gap in the fabric of the world that led through the void itself. It was through this portal that Borogove leaped, and it closed behind him in the next instant, its presence concealed entirely, both from view and from Goliath's keen arcane senses, by the smoke caused by the explosion and by the power of the energy field between it and the giant.

The unnatural power of the void appearing directly behind him in the middle of the air would be the giant's only clue as the archer appeared just a few meters above the level of his enemy's waist, hovering in mid-air using the power of his air-enchanted sword, which had already darted forth from its sheath and glowed a brilliant vermillion as its searing, oscillating blade tore upward toward the center of the giant's back. Having appeared in his blind spot and - should his anatomy have functioned like that of a Human - beyond the reach of his arms - although these were hindered regardless by the archer's binding spell, and would thus be very limited in their usefulness. In any case, the attack ultimately amounted to an incredibly elaborate feint. The giant, his hands occupied with their entrapment, his senses thwarted by the explosion of power from the front, and his focus likely taken up with the prospect of protecting his eye from the arrow aimed towards it, would have no reason to expect an attack from behind, one that was carried out almost in the very same instant as when he would perceive it. Although the resulting wound from the slash would perhaps not be crippling - the giant's armor was far too thick for even the enchanted blade to pierce through to his bones - or whatever equivalent he might possess - the cut across his back would still likely be painful enough to hinder him in the future. And, as it was, it seemed unlikely that even the formidable giant would escape unscathed.

"The Apocalypse is basically just a tutorial." - Sicon112.

"Due to the ambiguity of this wording, I am unable to determine whether or not I am the leader of the X-Men!" "UNIVERSE-BREAKING EPILEPSY RAVE!" - AMimsyBorogove

The smither is a truly formidable opponent. She managed to dodge with such ease. Wait... What is she doing? Goliath watched her channel some twisted, unnatural energy. It was of a blood-red glow, which behave as the lightning of Saturn's divine wrath. But it wasn't lightining. It wasn't the energy from the dreaded. It was worse. It was pure destruction, channeled from the forbidden depths of the universe. The kind of energy that would be used by the entities that came before the gods and the titans themselves. It was wicked and corrupted, and the magic from nature itself would reject its presence. The summoned energy, which could only be described as emptyness, void, nothingness, was one of the few things that would make Gaia twist during her nigh-eternal rest. Goliath could easily feel it, but not in the normal sense of the word. The natural energy around it would instantly attempt to run away from the abominable sickness that contaminated the air.

She is a virus in the world my mother made. I must destroy her. He raised his senses. Now the fight was truly serious. He cautiously watched his surroundings, starting to feel the energy around him and understand it clearly. For know, he felt nothing but the void around his enemy. He could see that the energy was imbued in her bow. He knew the results wouldn't be good for him.

He took the momentum he had as he stepped back, and kept taking the earth from under and mostly behind him to shape the boulder in front of him, with a momentaneous boost in growth, taking its size to medium, but he kept increasing its size. Before he could finish stepping back, three things happened. The first one, the debris in front of him shined with a silvery light, then it proceeded to explode, throwing debris at Goliath along with a shockwave that pushed him back. In the aftermatch of the explosion, a thick black smoke surged in front of him. Second, the same silvery energy could be felt upon the trees he held, flowing upon his hands and arms, ending the flux after being through his whole body. It slowed him down a little. And third, the smither shot an arrow from her bow. It came fast and accelerated after the explosion in front of him. It came towards his head, and it would have hit him, had him not saw it coming. Actively and instinctively he started to dodge the arrow as soon as he felt it being made. At first he did only move backwards, but he also tilted his head back. He saw it darting as a black blur a few centimeters in front of his head, emanating destructive power. The pitch-black embodiment of wickedness in the shape of a fast-moving projectile kept its trajectory, and exploded many metres behind Goliath. She is truly powerful. I must not let her attack me with her bow.

Goliath stopped himself from falling, with his feet and using his trees as support. It wasn't the best stance he could achieve, but he wasn't very vulnerable. But before he could stand upright, he felt some energy being dispersed behind him. Then he understood what it was the smither, who had teleported behind him. She stabbed him with presumably half of her sword, possibly more, but the size of the cut was fairly reduced, presumably because he wasn't on the position she though he would be. His armor and his own body, however, were very strong. Since the attack was off-angle, it would have damaged the blade a lot more than it would normally, not to talk about pulling it out of him. Had her made another slash, it'd probably have hit.

After her attack, it became all clear to him. She is able to manipulate elemental energy of sorts through her weapons. So far she is able to manipulate wind and pure destruction, asides of a miriad of other powers, as scattering energy to channel spells. But it all seems connected to her weapons. Wait... I see it now. She manipulated some of the water in the trees. I shall pay more attention to it. While he thought, he wasn't waiting. He kept building up his boulder, now big in size (this one is now about 7 Borogoves, but it's still growing). Goliath also channeled the earth around him. First, by dragging earth from underground upwards while strengthening some "pillars" he would left underground, keeping the area where he stood stable. Second, by controling the earth close to the smither, as means of imprisoning her. The earth would energize, mostly with the magic in the air, and would within seconds shape as a sphere that is still forming when it hops out of the ground, trying to englobe Borogove. Should one of those attacks succeed, if only partially, the earth within will not stand still. It will spin clockwise, and it will also change the earth from within with the earth without, generating an ever flowing cycle of earth, bruising her, or worse. Had Borogove tried to run, on the other hand, his attack would be very different.

Either way, Goliath turns to the smither, with both his weapons ready, and a huge boulder forming on his right side (about 9 Borogoves).

Dolphins are some of the smartest animals, yes, but by human standards… Let's say you should praise the god that forces them to stay handless and underwater.

Borogove smirked as he felt the resistance of the enemy's stony flesh abruptly broken by his blade as he slashed upward. The enemy had moved to the side, it seemed, causing his blade to be buried in the giant's side instead of cutting lightly across his back. Well, the archer was fine with that result, in any case. Although the blade would doubtless sustain some damage from the jarring effect of having to cut so deeply, Borogove had reinforced it with enough concepts to minimize this, and could easily repair the rest with the energy he already had at the ready. In any case, he'd finished his test. He now had a good feel for the giant's armor, and what would cut it. It was time to make his retreat. Completing his strike, he used the jolt as the blade caught on the inside of the enemy's body to pull himself. With no ground to brace on, this effect was greatly increased and, by going with the momentum and offering no resistance to it, it was easy for Borogove to fling himself around the giant's side. Although the barriers on his enemy's arms were breaking down, with his speed, he'd be able to dodge the enemy's arm, preventing a counter-attack.

But, it seemed, Goliath had other plans. A rumbling from below caught Borogove's attention as he spun away from his target, drawing his sword forth from the wound it had dealt. Looking down, he saw what he had feared. It seemed that the enemy was manipulating the earth again, and in an instant, the archer realized what the intended goal was. Walls of earth were beginning to rise on all sides, slowly closing in in an effort to entrap him. Well, it was clearly a well-made snare, given the speed at which the ground was rising, but it didn't take into consideration either Borogove's already fairly respectable distance from the ground, nor his velocity as he spun to the side and upward. Actually, there was another factor it had missed as well, for all around the area, several flashes of light were beginning to appear along the stone walls, both inside and outside. Borogove smiled, watching as the shards, most little bigger than splinters or clusters of dust, touched down all across the surface of the giant trap, creating runes all across its surface. As Borogove concentrated his airy ward, launching himself straight upward, he snapped his fingers.

"Sever," He said, and in that instant, the walls were abruptly pierced in countless places, tearing out a large chunk of earth. It wasn't enough to collapse the sphere completely, but the very top of the snare had now been completely destroyed. There was no way it could be closed in time to catch the nimble archer who already streaked out from within it at tremendous speeds. Flipping head over heels, he righted himself in the air, high enough to be on a level with the tops of most of the most gigantic of the ancient forest's trees. He was actually looking down on the giant now, and was doing so from quite some distance. Normally, the weak air concept he had placed in the sword probably wouldn't have been enough to carry him this high, but, having already begun preparing since before he had made his surprise attack, he had already corrected that issue. The aura of air around him had intensified several times over, and, even when he let go of his sword to draw his bow again, it remained hovering by his side, kept there remotely by the power of his will. Ah, he mused. Air was one of his favorite concepts.

Glancing down at his bow, he clenched his fist around it, and, in the next instant, it simply... ceased to be. The weapon collapsed into dust, dust which swiftly swept over the cracked blade of his sword, whirled around it, and vanished into it. The sword glowed red as the power of the void entered it, adding yet another concept to its already formidable repertoire.

But, before the archer had time to counter-attack, something abruptly changed on the ground below. It seemed the giant wasn't done with his attack. Grimacing, the archer simply continued channeling his concepts, and prepared for what was to come.

"The Apocalypse is basically just a tutorial." - Sicon112.

"Due to the ambiguity of this wording, I am unable to determine whether or not I am the leader of the X-Men!" "UNIVERSE-BREAKING EPILEPSY RAVE!" - AMimsyBorogove

Goliath observed Borogove easily flying past his earth trap, asides from exploding some of it. It seems her abilities are getting stronger. And I must react accordingly. He stopped controling the earth in front of him to shape a trap, but he kept draining earth from underground, creating pillars at some spaces. The hole underground increased by two at this point, and it would grow even more, to the sides and down.

He proceded to get together all the trees he had. Holding them all with both hands, he proceeded to stick them at the boulder he was making, which now was of a huge size (12 Borogoves). With the trees fixed in it, the next thing he did was to manipulate the earth to reinforce the handle, and to add spikes to the main body of the mace. Then, Goliath proceeded to manipulate the earth in front of him to bring trees closer to him. He managed to get 20 trees and to stick them together with the ones he had already, increasing the lenght of the mace.

Goliath made his way out of the crater he was in and stood holding his mace with both hands. Borogove waas on a tree standing taller than Goliath, but his mace was even higher than her. She fused the emptyness with her sword. I must pay attention for attack from all directions. he kept manipulating the earth underground, and started to prepare for manipulating the earth under the smither, althought from that distance it would be very tricky once he started. Before she could do her move, he swung his mace, sending a giant and powerful wave of wind towards Borogove.

Dolphins are some of the smartest animals, yes, but by human standards… Let's say you should praise the god that forces them to stay handless and underwater.

A weapon? So it seems I'm not the only one here with the power to create and wield armaments, Borogove mused, watching as his enemy began to shape up a giant weapon of his own. But, nevertheless. Smirking, he glanced down at his sword, and sprang into action. For some time now, he'd been preparing concepts. Although he'd had to use one to strengthen his air concept on his blade, he'd already fully prepared another to replace it. Now, he had the strength concentrated to add three concepts in quick succession. And so, concentrating his mind, even as the enemy's giant mace slowly began to take form, the archer quickly began to at last allow his energy to take form.

In that instant, the light in the air around him suddenly died out, and the void of darkness left in its wake began to ripple and writhe, an aura of blackness slowly encircling the floating warrior as, at the same time, the vermillion gleam of the void around his blade only grew brighter. The three concepts he had added - light, darkness, and void - had effects largely complementary to the concepts currently in effect. The first had but one effect: to absorb nearby light, and convert it directly into pure arcane power. Being a fairly high-level concept, it was efficient, and, moreover, effective. From the moment it came into being, Borogove could feel the strength of the blade begin to rise spectacularly. But, what was more, it also complimented the second concept he deployed, that of darkness, like shoes and a suit. After all, what was left in the absence of light but darkness? Using the mystical properties of this area of shadow, Borogove created yet another layer of physical reinforcement over his body, solidifying the shadows to both protect him from harm and to create a shroud that would carry him at an even greater pace than before. But this shroud could also be controlled through the sword, which would aid attacks as well, lancing tendrils of solidified shadow out from the blade of the weapon to cut the enemy, should the archer so wish. And, finally, there was the void. By increasing its power, Borogove further empowered the essence of destruction, its reality-rending essence only growing in strength. With the light to increase the output of all the other concepts, the blade had taken a gigantic leap in power in just those few moments in which the enemy made his own weapon manifest, and, by the time the giant raised his weapon to attack, the archer was prepared.

The mace, despite its massive size, was yet unable to reach Borogove at his distance and altitude. And yet, it did not seem that this was the intention of Goliath, for in the moment after the enormous weapon swept across the sky, the vacuum left in its wake collapsed, and air exploded outward in all directions. As the force of a gale burst upon the many defensive wards of the archer, he merely smiled... and watched as it broke harmlessly against his shield of condensed air, which absorbed the magic-less attack without any difficulty. He had already seen the capabilities of the shockwaves created by the giant's attacks in the very first engagement. Why would he not have been prepared for such an offensive now, when he had been granted so much time in which to do so? His air concept was already more than strong enough to resist such a weak attack.

"My turn," Borogove said simply, raising his blade with both hands. As he brought it into a combat stance, the air around him trembled, and the darkness around him grew more profound, an aura of shadow flecked with bloodcrimson expanding outward. Then, in the next instant, this aura collapsed, and like a falling star, the archer plunged abruptly downward, streaking towards the giant at tremendous speeds, like a bolt of living, malevolent lightning. The giant, still recovering from the swing of his massive hammer, was now exposed, and the swift-moving archer, positioning himself in an instant beneath Goliath's overextended guard, exploited this with ease. Raising his sword, he gave a grunt of exertion as he swept it across the air with all his might. In that instant, all of the power around him collapsed, converging on the blade of the sword as it swung. With an ear-shattering explosion like the collapse of a world, a screaming, crimson torrent of pure destructive power, guided by an arc of shadows that encased it, streaked forth from the blade directly toward the giant. The giant arc, empowered by the additional void concept the archer had added to the sword, was even wider than Goliath was, making evasion very likely impossible for a being of his bulk. And, although this did dissipate the attack's power somewhat, it was still concentrated across a single plane - albeit one high enough that he couldn't simply jump over it, yet low enough as to render throwing himself down impractical - focusing its strength enough to make it very dangerous. And, even if it missed, the only thing keeping the void energy from exploding in a cataclysmic, omni-directional blast was Borogove's will which controlled the shadows around it. Once those were released, the blast would explode regardless of if the giant managed to dodge. But, the archer knew that, powerful though this attack was, the giant would be prepared. Even if he didn't already have some sort of earthen shield at the ready, he would still likely be able to block with the haft of his new mace, scattering the explosion over his entire body prematurely and allowing him to weather its force.

But, of course, the archer wasn't one to throw out just one attack and then call things done. Actually, by the time this arc of power had finished splitting off from his sword, he was already fading into a gaping scarlet void in space, which vanished behind him. At the same time, he yet again appeared behind the giant, already swinging his blade, but at a distance. Goliath, having just used all of his prepared earth behind himself to form his weapon, would now likely be much more hard pressed to defend himself, especially since the shockwave of the first indiscriminate blast would break over him whether he blocked it or was struck by it, and would very likely send him staggering backward beneath his force. Following through on his previous movement, Borogove reversed his momentum, slashing upward once again in the instant he appeared. The void screamed as it danced across his blade, then once more was released, exploding violently across the vector of the slash in an arc that was much more wild and uncontrolled than the first. As the archer disappeared once again, these two attacks converged with the giant at their center, and, the shadows that held them at bay released, promptly exploded. The blast was tremendous, enough to uproot nearby trees and send them scattering in all directions as the earth itself was melted away. That which wasn't rendered molten by the power of the attack was simply turned to dust and scattered on the gale-like shockwave released as the void became a sphere, like a miniature sun at the heart of which would be trapped Goliath. Borogove didn't know if the giant had some way to block this tremendous blast, but, despite the fact that most of the light energy he had drained had been used up, he still wasn't one to risk his enemy's survival unscathed. If he had anything to say about it, he'd make sure that giant was reduced to dust! And so, cannibalizing the energy he'd begun preparing for a fourth concept after the attack, he channeled this power into the blade, further increasing the void's power.

A quiet groaning was heard in the heavens as a void split them apart momentarily, and the archer appeared, his emerald cloak flapping violently about him on the winds of his own attack, which were actually strong enough to reach him even though his barriers, although, thankfully, not enough to affect him. Raising his sword high over his head, he smirked as countless criss-crossing scarlet lines began to expand across the weapon, until it simply became a single glowing blade of vermillion power that was blinding to behold. As the sword's power peaked, its destructive energies screaming across the very heavens, Borogove laughed, and, with a mighty shout, cast it downward like a mockery of Zeus' lightning.

"Here! Take at least one more blade before you go!" Borogove roared. The winds parted, beginning to spiral downward like a tornado around the sword as it fell, flying straight like a javelin or an arrow, its point trailing scarlet as it cut through the very air itself. Darkness and light flashed around it in unison, and where the one was not, the other was stronger. Flames burned rampantly across its surface, and the air became dry and heavy as it passed through. And yet, although it remained almost unseen in the falling sword's destructive wake, a single, thin strand of energy yet connected it to the archer's outstretched hand, and, because of its lingering power, he did not fall, but rather soared high over the battlefield. Like lightning, the speeding projectile closed the distance, and, in the blink of an eye, it had reached the edge of the sphere of destruction surrounding Goliath. Its blade descended, and, like a falling Sword of Damocles, it struck the edge of the previous attack's energy.

The world itself trembled on its axis as, with a scream of power, the sword exhausted every last ounce of power that Borogove had just poured into it. The energy encasing the giant turned from scarlet to a void of jet black as every last bit of the light the blast had generated was consumed, and converted right back into power. A single pinprick of red light shone front from the top of the dome for a split second, and the air converged from all directions upon the blade that hovered over the darkness. The sword's power built up to a crescendo, and then, all at once, in a single burst, released all of its absorbed power and the extra energy with which the archer had enhanced it. The air scattered in all directions, ripping branches from the trees as it screamed across the world in a raging gale. The explosion rippled, then collapsed upon itself, a single pillar of crimson light condensing down directly on one point, the weight of the void piercing downward in a concentrated column and striking at one target: the giant. The power of this explosion was tremendous, its darkness consuming all in its path. For several moments, it continued uninterrupted. Then, as suddenly as it had begun... it ceased. The darkness vanished, and the sword faded into a void of its own creation. The overshadowed heavens cleared, and the blade appeared a moment later in the archer's hand. He gazed down at what had once been a forest clearing, only to see a giant crater amidst which flames yet burned silently, the trees all around uprooted and sent hurtling away, and the ground melted into dust. But the archer wasn't so overconfident as to grow complacent. He'd used up at least one of his void concepts - the weakened concept from the bow hadn't been able to withstand the tremendous energy output of his repeated attacks, and had been entirely exhausted - converting it directly into pure destructive power on top of his enemy. And yet, he had a feeling that the giant would survive. He didn't know how, mind you - he'd spared no expense in trying to obliterate his target completely - and yet, he simply had a feeling, considering the giant's remarkable resilience, that he would have lasted through this attack. The question was... in what condition? Borogove merely smirked, watched from above, and waited to see if his enemy would emerge from the smoke.

(Summary: 3 1/2 new concepts worth of energy added. Air attack blocked. Borogove slashed beneath the hammer as it finished its sweep upward, releasing a giant sword beam. Then he teleported, and released a sword beam from behind. This created a Sphere of Destruction. Then he teleported, empowered his sword, and threw it downward, creating a single Pillar of Destruction with the energy of three sword beams, all concentrated directly on top of Goliath. One void concept was used up for this attack. Borogove is currently hovering over the battlefield, which is mostly a charred, burnt wasteland with a giant crater in the center now.)

"The Apocalypse is basically just a tutorial." - Sicon112.

"Due to the ambiguity of this wording, I am unable to determine whether or not I am the leader of the X-Men!" "UNIVERSE-BREAKING EPILEPSY RAVE!" - AMimsyBorogove

Goliath expected Borogove to stop his attack. It was simply a test. The sword beam was half-expected, as he wasn't fully sure she could do it. However, she had sent a powerful wave of pure destruction at him. He could take it, but he would rather follow his dodging plan. Goliath ordered the dirt under him to open, and it fulfilled his order. Goliath fell in the hole he had been making, and closed it, leaving his mace behind.

The following events weren't seen by Goliath, but he felt it clearly. The smither teleported behind where Goliath would be, and sent another sword beam to meet the previous one, generating a sphere of pure destruction. The darkness within it was very destructive. Goliath was glad he had dodged it, even though he could have survived it. Next, the smither had teleported high in the sky, and threw his sword at the orb of nothingness. Goliath felt the twisted projectile descending and hitting the vile ball of emptyness, which promptly became a vast explosion. The cave Goliath had dug collapsed over him, as the shockwave of the attack hit him. The falling dirt and rock was meaningless, but the energy caused microfissures all over his body, asides from one or two cracks. He now would be easier to damage, but his armor kept pretty much intact. The aftermatch of the explosion ensued. My enemy gets stronger each second. She destroyed a huge part of my mother. She will not be forgiven. She will not survive. I have now nature fully on my side. She will now understand the true meaning of Gaia's wrath.

For an outsider, it would seems that the ground was raising on its own. But actually, it was Goliath, holding a mass of land as massive as himself with visible effort. She was a fool for attacking my mother. Now I don't even need to call for help. It will willingly come for me. As Goliath finished thinking this, the natural energy started to flow again, as it was dissipated by the previous attack. But it was different. It was... Angry, mad, twisting in an wicked maelstrom centered on Goliath. A faint glow covered the air around Goliath. The magic came from all directions, and it seemed nonstop. Right now, most energy had been dissipated, but it was coming, hungry for revenge upon Borogove. Goliath channeled all of the incoming power, and his stranght grew accordingly. The boulder he held was now easier to lift. Yes, boulder, because he kept a few seconds turning it into one. Now it was noticeable bigger than Goliath himself (1.2, 1.5 times, maybe more). Your power will be your demise. You will never be able to hid from me. He threw the boulder at Borogove at an unbelieveable speed. It was as fast as the ones he had thrown before, if not faster. And yet it flew straight at the smither. But it had a small surprise on it. It hitting or not her, it will divide itself into many smaller (but still bigger than Borogove) boulders after a sufficient amount of seconds for it had hit her or not. Then, these boulders would become even smaller ones (about half a Borogove, maybe bigger), going in all directions. But in the meantime, Goliath wouldn't stand there, watching. He had made two medium boulders, and with one in each hand, he threw them at the girl. And to finish his series of attacks, he made a final, very large boulder (about 9 Borogoves) and threw it at his opponent, but this one would subdivide itself into smaller boulders before hitting Borogove, in a way they'd partially keep their momentum.

After this series of attacks, he started to manipulate the area around him. If Borogove attempt to teleport around him, wherever he might try to, she would suffer the consequences. (currently it's a 10m circle, but it's increasing quickly)

Dolphins are some of the smartest animals, yes, but by human standards… Let's say you should praise the god that forces them to stay handless and underwater.

The ground trembled and shook, and the earth itself seemed to rise. The archer raised an eyebrow. As expected, the giant had survived, and seemed to have somehow managed to prepare a counterattack despite the widespread devastation raging above him. Borogove had intended to hinder his attacks, at the very least, by ripping apart the earth using his own void, but it seemed that despite this, the giant's mysterious world-bending power was even stronger than it had been before.

Ah. I understand. The reason my swords were so easy to create before... it was because the area here held an innate magic. By destroying the ground, I must have freed up the power within it. But then why did it recourse instantly to his control? Perhaps... His ability to control the earth must come from some sort of contract with it. Interesting. It's a good thing I don't rely on such a thing to create my weapons, or else he might have been able to restrict my blades creation. The archer analyzed the situation as best he could, but, at the moment, it seemed he had more important things to worry about, like the angry giant hoisting a boulder about the size of a large building at him. Blocking such an attack, naturally, would be completely impossible. Or would it be? As the attack flew and the archer streaked to the side, raising his blade to protect himself from the edge of the swift projectile with its power, to his surprise, the giant stone broke apart, splitting into countless component stones, which then split apart in turn, scattering the mass of the shot over a wide area.

So that's his plan. He's giving up power for area of effect.

Raising his blade, Borogove acted quickly. Concentrating all of his strength in front of him, he lunged forward with his blade, embedding it in the first stone that came for him. Although he was knocked backward by the force of the collision, he yet maintained control of himself, and, concentrating, he began to assimilate the matter inside of the boulder. But there wasn't much time. The whistling of countless projectiles all around him filled his ears, and in another moment, he'd surely be crushed by the stones that closed in from all sides. But, yet, he maintained his focus, plotting out countless attack vectors until the very last moment, at which point several things happened at once.

The stone he had affixed himself to cracked. Then, it shattered. But its shards were not of stone. Rather, they were countless, plainly-crafted blades, which shot outward in all directions in an explosion of cold, razor-edged steel. Striking the incoming stones, they broke apart, each grafting at least four runes onto the target with which it had collided... quadrupling its power as Borogove snapped his fingers.

"BIND!" He roared. In the next instant, a wall of silvery power shone forth all around him, forming a radiant sphere like a second sun. Stones collided with this rigid ward and broke apart, scattering into dust even as the barrier began to crack and break apart from the strain. By the time it had shattered, all of the attacks from the first stone had been deflected. But, to the archer's irritation, those weren't the only stones to contend with, for, screaming up towards him from below, two more giant rocks had been hurled, one right after the other. His barrier broken and himself knocked off balance, he had no choice but to defend himself directly. But, due to the passive method he'd used to counter the first barrage, his sword still had plenty of energy left, and had re-absorbed most - if not all - of the power of the barrier he had just generated thanks to its light concept, effectively allowing him to multiply its power several times over just by expending one fourth of the energy ultimately generated! At this rate, even with the energy he'd expended last time, he could still add another full-powered concept with time to spare to defend himself. But, he decided against this course of action. He held his power back, instead gathering it and condensing it as he prepared a truly powerful concept, one he was sure would be able to overcome his enemy. The giant seemed to be some sort of embodiment of the earth. A holy entity, against whom only darkness would succeed.

Heh. Very well, then! If only a demon can defeat you, then I'll gladly become one, and end this battle! With these thoughts, Borogove set about preparing his next concept. But, in the meantime, he had some pebbles to cut down to size! Raising his blade, he flared his power once again. Then, bracing the hilt with both hands, he began to move. He struck once, and the air split before the power of the void, severed cleanly along at least three different lines as the blade somehow managed to refract itself across the spacial plane, trisecting the first boulder cleanly. Turning with the force of his movement, Borogove struck again, and this time, four cuts appeared across the stone's surface, flames and dark power flickering across the air as a third strike then connected in almost the same instant as the first two swings had been made. Five cuts divided the stone, and at last, it gave way, scattering across Borogove's barrier in fragments too tiny to pose any real harm. But he was not done attacking, not by any means. In an instant, he'd struck again, then again, then again once more, moving so fast that he was but a blur, his blade dancing like an impassible wall across the air in front of him, and, in almost the next millisecond, the second boulder had suffered the same fate as the first, split by first six cuts, then seven, then at last eight. But even still, the archer was not through, for, as he had suspected, his enemy, like himself, was not one to cease attacking after just one or two potentially lethal attacks. Creating a final boulder of almost his own size, he hurled it at his airbourne enemy, and Borogove knew that this stone, unlike the first, would not split without first being cut apart.

So that was his plan. He wanted to knock me off balance by making me use my sword against his first attack, then pinned me with those two stones so I'd be forced to defend myself against this last one. I could just open a void again, but he has to have planned for that. The energy down there doesn't feel right. It's saturated with far too much Aether. He's cut me off from that route of escape as well. Well, then. Well then, I guess I'd best 'mimic the action of the tiger,' or however it was it went. Once more unto the breach, my friends, once more!

Turning about his attack once more, Borogove braced himself, and then slashed once more. The darkness writhed and roiled about him as he rose higher and higher, fleeing from the oncoming stone and scattering the clouds above. The sun shone down with blinding radiance, only for its power to be absorbed and converted directly into energy for the archer's concepts. Nine arcs of destructive power split the surface of the giant rock, but broke upon its surface as it collided with the archer's guard, sending a tremendous shock directly into his body that even managed to cause him pain through his many wards. His defenses buckled and began to cave, but his blade never ceased its continuous motion as it screamed through the air, carving into the incoming stone again and again. Ten simultaneous slashes, and the archer showed no signs of slowing. Eleven arcs of energy split the boulder at once, and he only grew faster. Twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen! He kept a count that steadily rose in his mind as he cut again and again, speeding up all the while. His blade split the air, refracting across reality until it was a dance of a steadily growing number of blades, all cutting into the stone at once. Chunks of earth were sheared away and sent crashing down towards the earth below. The stone slowly crumbled, and cracks appeared across its surface, even as Borogove's shields finally failed him. Seventeen, eighteen, nineteen... Giving a mighty roar, he drew up his blade for a final strike, and then slashed downward. At once, twenty cuts appeared across its surface, and the giant projectile was shattered into countless pieces. An explosion of dust clouded the sky, and darkness continued to spread over the heavens as Borogove absorbed the sun's radiance to fuel his power.

And, when the dust cleared, Borogove yet floated in the heavens, power roaring around him as he gasped for breath, recovering from the strain of his reality-breaking attack. But, despite his valiant defense, he was not unharmed. A long, shallow cut had appeared across his left shoulder, splitting through his cloak and staining his arm with blood, a wound left by the impact of a particularly large piece of shrapnel. He grimaced, glancing down at the appendage as it hung uselessly by his side.

Tch. There goes my arm, I guess.

(Yeah, with the way Xana set up this fight, I just couldn't help myself. The reference was too good to pass up.)

"The Apocalypse is basically just a tutorial." - Sicon112.

"Due to the ambiguity of this wording, I am unable to determine whether or not I am the leader of the X-Men!" "UNIVERSE-BREAKING EPILEPSY RAVE!" - AMimsyBorogove

Goliath watched his enemy slash through every stone he threw at her, until the point where she raised above the clouds, generating a mantle of darkness that increased in size quickly. Impressive. Her sword techniques are greater than I thought. And right now she's using the power of light and darkness to strenght herself. I may need help with this one.

Goliath focused his powers. He kept channeling the energy around him, which speed increased every second. The hatred around him glowed stronger, but he restrained said glow quickly, enchanting both him as the earth under him so to spent the massive amount of magic. The area he could quickly doubled, and the earth on it strenghtned with the wrathful energy around. Goliath made two boulders six times bigger than Borogove in less than half the time he had taken before. And yet, he held one with each hand, and threw both at the smither. While he did so, two more boulder grew. One was 9 times bigger than Borogove, while the other was as big as the ones he just threw. Hi picked up both, and threw said orbs of earth towards the girl. The smaller went first. It was made to "explode" just before it hit her. The bigger one, however, was supposed to "shoot" a sphere three times bigger than Borogove at the same moment the other orb exploded.

Even if she has the power to control the earth, it will not answer to her. It hates her too much to do so. Had Goliath thought it, a final sphere was complete. It was imbued with more twisted anger than any of the others. Any contact she could make with this boulder would result into a beam of agony. And it wasn't simply a boulder. It was as big as Goliath himself, and it was made to explode upon getting close to the smither. If any of the subsequent rocks hit Borogove, the energy in the others will move as in a chain lightning through the other stones to hit her. He threw it at her.

And yet, the ground around him was heavily imbued with his powers in a 30 meters radius, and icreasing. If she teleport close, he would be ready.

Dolphins are some of the smartest animals, yes, but by human standards… Let's say you should praise the god that forces them to stay handless and underwater.

(Note: All elemental references in regards to Goliath's attacks/powers are simply converted to Borogove-terminology because that's how he perceives them. His definitions of the elemental concepts in question are what affect their abilities, so even if Goliath's powers wouldn't be defined by an element in his terms, they are in Borogove's terms, hence the narration.)

So, he thinks that strategy will work twice, huh? Borogove thought, smirking as he crossed his blade idly over his chest, watching as the giant began forming more boulders, faster than ever. It seemed his hypothesis had been right. Aether was pouring out of the ground for miles, either condensing itself into stones for Goliath to throw, or beginning to pool in an expanding ring around him, probably intended either as some sort of trap or finishing blow. By the look of things, he was using some sort of tie to the earth to invoke it, something that the archer, admittedly, couldn't do. But, his methods, although a little less efficient, had their own advantages. For example, that giant, no matter how strong he was, couldn't overwhelm Borogove's control over matter and the elements within the jurisdiction of his own soul. By superimposing his existence over reality, he could subsume any material or power, no matter how much it resisted him. In short, this made it impossible to cut off his abilities, and, on the flip side, allowed him to leech off of the powers of others... with the right concepts. Of course, given the giant's strength, this normally wouldn't work. But, with the malevolent power of the concept he'd just finished charging, he'd be able to subvert even this stalwart enemy's abilities, and use them to his advantage. The giant's magical abilities would only work because of his connection to reality. But once Borogove rejected the rules of reality and substituted the law of his soul, Goliath would have no vector by which to resist him. The Aether creeping through the ground was of no consequence - just a possible power source his enemy had foolishly left at his disposal.

Twitching slightly, the archer placed his blade against his broken arm. For a moment, this seemed like a completely inconsequential gesture. That is, until the blood dribbling slowly from his shoulder dripped down onto the blade, turning its radiance from vermillion to darkest crimson. The ominous power of the void expanded and condensed, its nature warping into a truly twisted, hateful power that screamed intent to kill and the might with which to do so across the entire blackened heavens. The clouds collapsed as the sword's power tripled, its range vastly expanding for a split second to encompass every last particle of moisture in the entire sky, using its very first concept to absorb these and convert them directly to power, forming a whirling sphere of clouds all around the archer as their power was instantly absorbed, then condensed into an even smaller area than before around him. A scarlet glow surrounded by darkness shrouded his entire being, and red lightning flashed across the heavens, a tremendous, chilling power spreading across the entire battlefield. The archer spoke three words, and the mighty concept which he had created became law, just as inexorable as the rules of gravity, and of motion.

"Cursed Sword: Muramasa."

The power of the Muramasa concept was simple. In exchange for an offering of blood - usually the enemy's, but in this case, his own would have to suffice, hence why he had allowed himself to sustain a wound to his already useless limb - it would grant - perhaps this wasn't the best word. Rather, it would possess its wielder's body until its lust for blood was sated, and even after the sacrifice had been given, it would remain drawn until all enemies against whom it was to be used were dead - a malevolent power to whatever blade held the concept, and to the blade's wielder. It would not stop until the enemy was dead, and, to reach that end, condensed and vastly amplified the power already held in the blade. With a weapon that had already been given such energy, this tripling of power was overwhelming. As the archer slowly brought up the demonic sword into a combat stance, the sheer force of the weapon's newfound energy was enough to release a tremendous, screaming wind that ripped the first thrown boulder into dust instantly as Borogove used his absorbed energy to add yet another concept.

This one, based in Aether, had three purposes. Firstly, it would passively heal its wielder - taking care of that annoying cut in his shoulder now that its usefulness had ended, and, with enough time, perhaps even the broken bones in his arm. Secondly, it would enhance the user's physical body more effectively than all of the reinforcement concepts he had added thus far combined, even with the amplification abilities of Muramasa. When one took that curse into affect... well, let's just say he wouldn't be needing to go to the trouble of creating voids to travel instantly anymore. But its third ability was by far its most potent. Namely, it would drain away all forms of aether it came into contact with, directly or indirectly, almost instantaneously. That included the power the giant had used to shape these boulders of his, as well as the vast pool of energy in the ground below, the range of which he wouldn't even have to enter to drain it! Borogove smirked as power from the first destroyed projectile entered his blade, taken subtly and yet quickly enough that Goliath probably wouldn't even realize it had been absorbed rather than destroyed. Raising his sword and slashing once, the second boulder was atomized just as the first had been.

As the giant continued throwing boulders, unaware of the power he was giving to his enemy, Borogove merely smirked and swept his blade through the air twice more, annihilating the second volley before either could even dissipate into its intended spread of attacks. Draining the power from these, Borogove prepared to do the same with the final stone, but stopped.

It's a trap. That boulder wasn't shaped with aether. I can tell by analyzing its makeup. The power inside that stone is more along the lines of a curse... Void? He has access to that element as well? But, no matter. It's not like such a projectile can catch me, anyway. Smiling, the archer focused on his power as the boulder came on, and did two things.

First, he released the strength that was holding him up.

Second... he accelerated.

In the blink of an eye, he had traveled like a red comet, flashing from his position in the air down to the ground. It hadn't even taken him a second to traverse the distance, and almost the instant he had moved, he had already crashed into the ground about fifty meters away from the enemy, not close enough to be reached by his aether pool, but close enough to reach it. The earth buckled and broke beneath the force of his landing, yet he remained completely unharmed by the impact, and, by the time his silhouette had finished blurring from movement, he had already plunged his blade downward into the ground. In an instant, all of the aether in the earth became his target. The giant, very likely unaware of his new concept, would likely be taken completely by surprise when his energy was suddenly violently torn away as it expanded to meet the archer and entrap him through whatever means it was that the giant was currently planning. But not only his pool of energy was targeted - far from it. Rather, every last particle of strength that he had called upon from the earth below was now being attacked, and, if he didn't realize what was happening in time, stolen from him in just a matter of seconds thanks to Muramasa's evil curse. Even if he did understand what was happening, considering the sheer amount of power he had prepared all around him, it was essentially a foregone conclusion that he would not be able to save it all from the fast-acting effects of Borogove's curse.

Which was, of course, exactly as the archer planned. The giant would perhaps realize now that almost all of his ranged attacks had been prepared for, and hence rendered almost useless to him. If he wanted to attack the archer now without simply empowering him, he'd have to attack directly, which would only render him a sitting duck compared to Borogove's newfound speed. But, even if he didn't expose himself in such a manner, the archer was already setting the final preparations in place for his coup de grace. It didn't matter how powerful the giant was. If Borogove lasted long enough to fire this attack... he had absolutely no chance of survival.

It seems she can absorb my attacks. Tsk. Losing a smither like her to a demonic force like Muramasa. It's actually kind of sad. And yet she is absorbing the power around me. Mother is even angrier right now. Atlas, I'll need your assistance. As if trying to manipulate the earth around him, Goliath ordered the energy around him to stop coming. For now. it should rest in the distance, far from the girl's reach. But the giant was not over. Another energy started pouring onto him, apparently coming out of nowhere. The slight breeze started stopped it sweet dance, and started rampanging through the battlefield. It came form the south, from the west, from the east and from the north. It started spinning around, until many miniature whirlwinds took form everywhere. A thunder echoed in the sky, without any lightning, but much stronger than any thunderbolt could ever make. The clouds started moving in a circular pattern, and became denser. Every single whirlwind became stroger and bigger. The clouds started to turn grey as if they were made of ash. The miniature tornadoes - yes, miniature tornadoes, because they were too small to be a real tornado, but yet they were much, much stronger than one - started moving around, as if they were tentacles or arms... Or even... Fingers... The clouds high in the sky turned pitch-black, and a fake night fell over the land. The only light now was the smither's own power, glowing blood-red. Another thunder soared the world, as if hundreds of bombs were being exploded upon the arena. And who was to say that an explosion did not happen? The mighty shockwave cracked stones and took down trees, even though there were none at the warzone right now. Finally, the maelstroms moved for the edge of the battle field, and started a dance of horror and fear around it. As if they were in the center of the red spot, the night-looking clouds upon them looked like the eye of the biggest storm one would ever see. At last, a final thunder roared, but this one... Was different. It was a grow that would instigate fear even in the heart of the king of the gods. The sheer shockwave rampaged through the entire combat area, destroying almost everything in its wake. Looking upwards in the midst of clouds, one could see two very, very faintly yellow glow in the shapes of a sphere. Under them one could see... A blur, maybe a rock, obsidian? Bedrock? No mortal could certainly see what there was. But they would knew it was only one single arm, holding the face with two golden eyes, eyes made for hunting. Their owner was hungry. Very hungry.

Goliath was unnafected by any of this. He was blessed angainst natural conditions. He wacthed as his enemy had to deal with then, and in the meanwhile he created a boulder. But this time was different than before. He simply touched the ground and lifted it. It was pure strenght that had made the rock. It also made it denser and heavier by reducing its size. Now it was as big as Goliath himself, and yet he held it with one hand. He then threw the projectile at Borogove, much faster than the ones he had thrown before, and started walking towards his enemy, ready to strike her down. Even if I'm not strong enough to bring her down, I still can outlast her. She will know the true powers of a titan.

Dolphins are some of the smartest animals, yes, but by human standards… Let's say you should praise the god that forces them to stay handless and underwater.

Borogove smiled calmly as the power he had been absorbing was swiftly drawn away. While on the one hand that meant that he wouldn't be able to use this venue of gaining power any longer, it also meant Goliath would be severely handicapped when it came to attacking, which made his job much easier. And, from the combined power in the ground and in the stones he had deflected before, he had managed to form enough energy to create at least two concepts. But, he would not use it for such a purpose. That would have been such a waste, he mused, when in another few moments he'd have the necessary strength to end this fight permanently.

But, it seemed, his enemy had other ideas. Without his first fount of divine support, to Borogove's frustration, he decided to call upon a second. The sky grew dark, cutting off the light he'd been draining to empower himself, and a giant shape took form in the clouds. The archer didn't like the look of this. The enemy had sealed off the battlefield, and this time had done so by a means he couldn't circumvent. Fortunately, this entity, whatever it was, although it was physical, seemed preoccupied with just sealing the battlefield and draining the air within. However, due to the nature of his sword as a projection of his soul, he was already sealed away safely in an alternate form of existence where this god's powers over natural phenomena had no backing. Still, he supposed. That meant he wouldn't be able to leave the shroud of his sword, or, in fact, even take a hit, if said hit was powerful enough to break his barrier. That would expose the air which he had to the god's reality, allowing it to snatch away that which Borogove had collected. Tch. How troublesome.

Subverting his light concept, which he now had no more use for, he combined its energy with his water concept for a moment, draining all of the water he could from the ground below and converting it directly to power. Even if light, air, and aether had been taken from him, this means, at least, was still a viable option. But, he didn't have long. The giant was already taking up another boulder, this one lacking in the aetheric properties of his last barrage. Borogove supposed that meant there was no sense in destroying it, and, now that the enemy's aether field had been torn apart, he could move about as he pleased. So, as the giant advanced towards him, casting the stone as he did so, Borogove merely drew his sword forth from the ground, and... accelerated.

A loud roar might have rang out through the air, were it still present, but sound had been rendered nonexistent by the vacuum the deity had created, rendering the sonic boom that otherwise would have sounded as Borogove traveled instantly around the edge of the battlefield - albeit not too close to the walls of air generated by the god's hand - to the opposite side of the devastated area. He smirked. Although he hadn't been accelerated by the lack of air or particulate matter to slow him down - he'd already been fast enough to travel instantly even without his voids from the moment he used Muramasa - it did make doing so considerably less costly, power-wise, especially since there was plenty of darkness in the absence of the sun's light for him to use to reinforce himself, making him much more durable, strong, and, in theory, fast than he had been before. In a way, the giant had helped Borogove as much as he had hindered him.

By the time the boulder reached where the archer had been, he was long gone, disappeared in an instant from the giant's view. Although his power had relocated, which would make him easy enough to find, it would delay Goliath's advance by a couple of seconds, which was all the archer really needed. He'd completed charging the two concepts worth of energy gained from absorbed aether and light, and was already preparing to do the same with the water he'd just absorbed. After he finished with that, he could circumvent the entire waiting process of creating a third concept by recycling the extra power he'd just put into his water enhancement and converting it directly to the necessary energy. Now that light was no longer usable, why slow himself down by keeping a useless concept when he could just use its energy to speed the process up, anyway?

(Borogove Limit Break in... 3 Concepts. Current rate of charging... 2 Concepts per turn, plus one Concept ready to be recycled. Final rate... 3 Concepts per turn. Estimated number of turns until PREPARED... 1. Estimated number of turns until FIRED... 2. Estimated collateral damage... Still everything.)

"The Apocalypse is basically just a tutorial." - Sicon112.

"Due to the ambiguity of this wording, I am unable to determine whether or not I am the leader of the X-Men!" "UNIVERSE-BREAKING EPILEPSY RAVE!" - AMimsyBorogove

Goliath saw his enemy disappear from his field of vision. But he yet could feel his energy. This fight is getting too big. I must get ready to end this. With that thought, he turned behind, and now he faced his enemy. He positioned himself in a battle stance, a focused his power. Another thunder roared, this time, it was as strong as an explosion, echoing through all the battlefield, coming together with a smashing air pressuring from above, that was nearly instantly taken away due to the vacuum. But yet, the ground was there, to sustain the mighty shockwave. The wall of maelstroms around the battlefield grew stronger and bigger. The two gods over the battlefield seemed to be slightly lower than before... Slightly lower in comparison with them, actually. The golden eyes glowed slightly more, as if opening from a long slumber. Either way, Golaith was ready to strike or defend, whatever the girl was about to make. The pure distilled strenght fueled him granite flesh. His wounds had done a noticeable healing by this point.

Dolphins are some of the smartest animals, yes, but by human standards… Let's say you should praise the god that forces them to stay handless and underwater.

The air broke over the archer, not even affecting him as it returned, just as it had failed to harm him when it was snatched away. Smiling calmly, he drew forth his sword from the ground, and holding it up, focused on one final thing. The water concept, some of its excessive strength no longer needed, split into two concepts worth of energy. One concept remained, as Borogove didn't want to deplete such an advantageous ability excessively. The other, on the other hand, joined up with the full power he had gathered thus far. He smirked. The god in the sky was of no consequence to him. He'd be able to end this battle long before the summoned entity could touch down. And so, he condensed his power, forming a single concept with the massive well of stored energy within him. Muramasa glowed a brilliant crimson amidst the darkness, and the shadows around Borogove danced and writhed as the blade seemed to grow larger and more formidable as the power he had just prepared was amplified three times over by the Muramasa concept. With fifteen concepts worth of energy coursing through him, Borogove yet hesitated, and instead held back ten concepts worth, shaping it into a reserve force he could deploy instantly should his first attack fail. And yet, as things stood, the giant had foolishly allowed him time to prepare an attack more dangerous than Goliath could possibly imagine. With this next move, he declared checkmate. There was absolutely no possibility of escape from this next attack.

It was time.

And so he focused, and began to add his concept...

(Borogove Limit Break... NEXT TURN.)

"The Apocalypse is basically just a tutorial." - Sicon112.

"Due to the ambiguity of this wording, I am unable to determine whether or not I am the leader of the X-Men!" "UNIVERSE-BREAKING EPILEPSY RAVE!" - AMimsyBorogove

A final thunder roared... But it didn't stop. As the air finished disappearing from the combat area, the only way the thunder could roar was through the marlstroms around the battlefield. And it did, but said maelstroms had grown too big and too strong. They've fused together, into one supermassive storm, with the eye being the place where the two combatants stood. No one could tell how big was the storm other than the gods themselves. Up in the sky, the two eyes were glowing as two massive suns, and the arm was barely holding the heavens.

The strenght within Goliath was overhelming. It was simply power boost. It was more strenght than any mortal could hold. The gods had created Goliath themselves, and that's what kept him alive. Goliath held a power that could be described as... A concept. The concept of strenght, of power, the concept of being able to lift anything, including the heaven itself. The power of a god, whom is able to change reality itself. And so did Goliath. As his enemy did, Goliath also created a sphere of his own reality, proportional to the size of Borogove's. Within it there was pure conceptual strenght, and Goliath. And the latter was now the master of his own tiny dimension hole, as was the smither.

A bolt of white light came from the sky, and a pillar of energy flowed from the ground. Both took place within a second, but both powered Goliath's dimension sphere. One gave him the heavenly hunger, and the other the nature's wrath. Goliath wasn't sure how much power his enemy had, but he had his. And now she would met the true power of a titan. Shall her bring a dimension shattering power, Goliath will bring his. The true battle started now.

Dolphins are some of the smartest animals, yes, but by human standards… Let's say you should praise the god that forces them to stay handless and underwater.

Borogove's smile never faltered as his final preparations were completed. It seemed his enemy was so overconfident in his own power as to not even bother attempting to stop him from firing his attack. Foolishness. Instead, the enemy was trying to use his own tactic against him, superimposing his own existence over reality and creating a domain of absolute power. Hmph. Let him try. While he had made a dimensional hole phenomenon similar to Borogove's blades manifest, of what use would it be to him? The only reason his blades could actually use this as a defensive measure was because of their ability to leech off of power from concepts. Without such an ability of his own, how exactly did he expect to utilize the phenomenon at all save to momentarily blunt the force of an attack before his realm collapsed? All he'd done was create an area where the concept of "power" was all that mattered, and that was a concept that existed within his own blades as well, giving him a tether for their existence, even inside of his enemy's sphere. Besides, even if he hadn't had a tether, void was the essence of non-existence! Even had his enemy held a concept-draining ability, utilized the dimensional hole to its fullest, and had given him no tether for his blades' continued existence, he could still have easily circumvented all these things through the power of the void, which cut through reality like a hot knife through butter. No, the only thing the giant had done was put himself at a massive disadvantage. After all, with his own existence superimposed over reality and no means of transferring it safely if the space containing his essence was destroyed, such as Borogove's rune ability, he'd only made himself a bigger target! Even if his physical body wasn't directly damaged, Borogove could now bypass giving him a chance to block or dodge altogether and simply target his very existence! In short, Goliath had effectively cut off all routes of his own escape, giving Borogove the perfect foothold to finish him off in a single move. The archer had just finished preparing that move.

"So, you think you're a god, huh?" Borogove spoke directly to his enemy at last. "How unfortunate for you. If you'd been anything else, these blades might have been less efficient at killing you." Raising his working arm, he pointed his blade at the giant, giving him no time to comprehend this statement before he'd already struck. Adding the concept he'd prepared for so long, the archer at last made his move.

"One of a Million," He declared, and his words became reality. In an instant, the power of the sword in his hand - the blade was made with one concept worth of energy, and imbued with nine concepts worth of power, giving it a total power level of 10 concepts - was copied exactly 999,999 times over. But it didn't stop there. Even as, for a split second, countless blades appeared in a single, vast cloud all around the battlefield, unmoved by the divine maelstrom all around them, Borogove's power continued to skyrocket as every single blade's Muramasa concept took effect on all of the concepts of the others. If each blade was considered to have a power level of 10, plus the multiplier on itself and the other swords, the power of each sword could be equated to 10 times 3 raised to the millionth power, a number so large that it would be over 11 miles long if actually written out. Therefore, Borogove's total power in concepts was now a million times that, an incomprehensibly vast amount of power so absurd that it very likely could not be determined by human mathematics without the assistance of a supercomputer.

But, of course, the giant would have no time to comprehend this fact. Each sword was already capable of transmitting itself and even the added mass of a wielder instantaneously even before their power was amplified. With this added power, and the very conductive darkness the giant had unintentionally provided as a material for added reinforcement, they very likely could have crossed the entirety of the universe several thousand times within the time it took a light particle to move one inch. Before Goliath's divine mind could even process what had just been said, and before he would even be able to perceive the archer's power even beginning to increase, Borogove had already completed his attack. With his incredible levels of power and exactly one million anti-god class weapons - Muramasa was, after all, a cursed, demonic, hell-realm sword - combined with the massive target Goliath had made himself by painting his own existence over the entire area around his body, there could only be one result: complete and total annihilation.

In less than a nanosecond after the million blades had appeared, half had already vanished again, fading into 500,000 voids of their own creation. In that same instant, the entire inside of the giant's dimensional hole became a single, gaping hole in reality, both the reality of the outside and the reality of his own existence. It had been foolish, assuming that Borogove would make his attack from outside his newly created self-dimension, when he could just as easily open a void right into it. The void was non-existence itself, and pure power that dwarfed even that of Goliath and his gods combined. Goliath wouldn't just be completely powerless to stop the evil energy that now flooded into his existence directly, rather, the very concept into which he had converted his existence would actually become fodder for his own demise!

In an infinitesimal fraction of a nanosecond after the blades' creation, exactly half of them had emerged into Goliath's dimensional hole, already traveling at speeds that made light seem stationary. In the very instant in time that they appeared, they had already traversed the distance between the point of their emergence and the enemy's body. No matter how fast he was, he couldn't have dodged, even by stopping time. The speeds these blades moved at were far beyond Relativistic, and violated all laws of nature to begin with. Moving outside of time was hardly a stretch for them. And so, from all sides, occupying every single square inch around Goliath, they collapsed inward, homing in on his body directly just in case somehow, in some way, he actually managed to move himself to even the most imperceptible of extents. This was a shower of pure death, one that would not be deterred nor evaded. Borogove was taking every nessecary precaution to ensure that Goliath did not, could not, and would not survive.

Then, about half a nanosecond after the blades had been created, they struck. Even if Goliath somehow managed to move himself out of the way of even one of the blades, which, coming from all sides, would still render such an evasion remarkably pointless, he couldn't possibly dissipate his own existence in the area in time to save his soul from destruction as one blade brushed against another. In that instant, an incomprehensibly powerful surge of ultra-condensed void energy was released from both weapons. This, in turn, struck another few blades, which would in turn strike more all around them, creating a single, overwhelmingly powerful blast of energy all around Goliath that was continuously redirected right back towards his body by all of the blades that, at the same time, would be doing everything possible - even transcending possibility - so as to be stabbing at his stony flesh no matter how hard he tried to run or hide. The blast expanded outward almost instantaneously, connecting every single sword and causing them thus to release even more energy. The antithesis of existence itself had been made manifest, contained within Goliath's own reality by his own misguided attempt to defend himself as it wrecked havoc on the very concept of him, both his body and his existence. This was an instantaneous, very likely inescapable attack on every possible level, with enough energy to have rent the veil of reality asunder with an almost pathetic ease. This was the void itself, the most powerful and dangerous enemy of all who embodied existence. This was the ultimate means of killing a god.

Or was it? Borogove didn't think so, at least, for at the same time as he made his attack, he set about working with the other 500,000 blades he still had at his disposal, adding the ten concepts worth of energy he'd kept in reserve to his very first weapon, an energy which that then amplified by all million of his others, effectively doubling the already preposterous power he'd already achieved. He smiled, letting go of his sword just long enough to snap his fingers - declaring "Shatter" as he did so and causing every last one of his swords within Goliath's reality to explode with world-breaking force - before he once more took up the weapon and used half of his (2,000,000)(10 x 3^1,000,000) concepts worth of energy to begin reshaping his own blade. It twisted and expanded, and, at the same time, he added a concept even more sinister than Muramasa, one that was even more potent at killing gods. At the same time, he began to absorb every last one of his remaining 500,000 swords directly into his main weapon, imbuing it with the entirety of his preposterous power. Granted, the attack he'd just fired probably would destroy Goliath's existence so thoroughly as to expand and blow up the rest of the Drome along with it - although he himself, encased within his own little dimension with a void-absorption concept already prepared, would be completely unharmed by the attack - but just in case a single conceptual scrap of the giant's nature had managed to survive the attack, he just wanted to be sure he had a weapon capable of destroying anything he hadn't already destroyed and dealing with the problem. Above all else, the archer didn't leave survivors. Or old battlefields, for that matter.

"The Apocalypse is basically just a tutorial." - Sicon112.

"Due to the ambiguity of this wording, I am unable to determine whether or not I am the leader of the X-Men!" "UNIVERSE-BREAKING EPILEPSY RAVE!" - AMimsyBorogove

Goliath had no time to react. His enemy's attack took effect in less than one second. All he could do was to keep himself still after being hit by thousands of millions swords made of the darkest void. The universe screamed at the distilled destruction that was poured, as everything started to undo itself. But he wasn't dead. He was alive. He maintaned himself with the strenght of Atlas, the hunger of Ouranus and the wrath of Gaia. His body was full of cracks. He wouldn't fall now.

A second round of explosions hit Goliath. The reality bubble that he had made had been reduced to pieces, but now it was just... Dust. Yes, dust is the only word that could possibly describe the actual state of it. But this wasn't a problem. Rather, since it was reduced to dust, Goliath easily gatheredf it back to him, and absorbed it. Even if Borogove could do the same, the energy was much closer to his influence than hers. But he didn't simply absorb it. He gathered a sphere in his hand, about the size of Borogove.

She judges herself better than me. She underestimates me. Now, let's see if she can take a taste of my own reality. And with that thought, he finished making the dimensional sphere, sustained by the power of three gods. And he threw it at Borogove. A sphere which would only obbey its own physics, and would move as fast as her last attack. But with a much bigger destructive power. It would hit, grow and destroy, within and without its own universe. The true battle started now. And Goliath kept making hundreds of those spheres, firing them around the battlefield. Their homing effect was nothing compared to their area of effect. They would hunt and kill the smither. No mortal has survived a battle angainst me.

He started building a much bigger sphere, with his both hands, over his head.

Dolphins are some of the smartest animals, yes, but by human standards… Let's say you should praise the god that forces them to stay handless and underwater.

Assuming that he could beat Borogove in a contest of speed was immensely naive, especially when the archer was already preparing an even more powerful attack to finish the job he'd failed to achieve last time. As it was, Borogove had the energy of a million swords thanks the amplification of the concept he had just added to his original weapon, even without the 500,000 blades he'd just destroyed. The giant's attack was moving at the pace that each one of the archer's swords had set before, but Borogove, with all of his remaining power condensed into a single weapon, could move at a million times that! The countless projectiles now spreading across the arena were painfully slow in his eyes. Without even accelerating to his current running velocity, he could have easily escaped them all. But, to what end? The entire arena was going to come under the destructive effects of the giant's desperate attack anyway. And, although the being in the sky above was sealing the battlefield on this level of reality, Borogove could just as easily simply sidestep reality altogether and move to the outside of the divine domain in which the combat had, up until this point, taken place.

How troublesome, he thought, analyzing the giant's attack as he idly swept his light-coated weapon through the air, opening a gaping void in space before him, through which he stepped faster-than-instantaneously as the instantaneous attack broke around him, escaping the indiscriminately destructive barrage as he vanished briefly from that plane of reality. So... As long as he has a source of energy, he'll continue to attack me, huh? That creature in the sky, and that strange arm. And even the planet itself... He's really forcing me to go all-out with this one. But, that's fine. If all three of those existences will continue to animate him even after I ripped apart his soul, I'll just have to destroy them all in one go before he can make another move. Fortunately, the way things are now, that should be fairly easy. The cold void around him as he blinked back into the corporeal realm was dispelled by the overwhelming heat of his blade, while the vacuum into which he emerged was immediately replaced by the air he'd brought with him. The stars twinkled faintly in the void of space, and the planet, a vast blue and green mass - broken only by a black and crimson blotch at the center of a whirling spiral of clouds, at the center of which he could clearly make out the form of the god Ouranus - was spread out far below him. Although his target might move eventually, he had a few hundred years in his own now dilated time to make his move before the giant's instantaneous speed would actually be able to process that he'd even disappeared. In short, he had all the time he needed. Glancing around himself for possible weapons he could employ in addition to that which he already held, he weighed his options.

Let's see... To destroy the planet, and those three gods along with it, what could I use? I suppose this blade of mine would do the trick, but it might be easier to employ a more creative means... First, his eyes fell upon the round white lunar sphere, but he quickly rejected this idea. The moon would be too small to eradicate the planet completely, even if he threw it with all his might. Then how about one of the more distant heavenly bodies? He could open a void and cast the earth into the core of Jupiter, he supposed, but that planet, with all its divine associations, would likely fall under the domain of some other deity the giant could just call to aid him. In fact, almost every other planet, and even the sun itself, which otherwise would have been very effective as a projectile weapon, could all likely be countered by some other summon of the seemingly indestructible being below him. No, he supposed. Even if he threw the entire solar system at Goliath, he wouldn't be eradicated completely and utterly enough for the archer to be utterly sure of his demise. He had no choice, he realized. He'd just have to use his sword. But, in its current form, with its current concepts, it would be rather troublesome to disintegrate a planet, especially one with four gods present on its surface. He needed a weapon with more piercing power, and, more importantly, one that was specifically designed to destroy gods. Well, fortunately for him, he had just such a weapon already in the making! The vermillion light around his sword began to contract as the blade elongated, becoming cylindrical as it grew in size, becoming as long as the archer was tall. Broadening into a head atop a haft, the sword became a spear, blood red in its entirety, that gleamed with a power far more evil than that of Muramasa.

"God-Killing Spear: Lance of Longinus." With this declaration, the archer slowly raised his new spear over his head. So, his targets were Ouranus, the arm of Atlas that held him aloft, the giant directly beneath him, and the heart of the planet itself. Well, that was convenient. They'd been so polite as to even line up for him! This was going to be easier that he'd thought! With a single cast of his world-shattering lance, he could simultaneously impale them all, then just release enough energy to disintegrate the planet from the inside out. Now that he'd amplified his power so many times over, that would be a relatively simple task to accomplish, especially considering the amount of void energy already lingering on the surface of the planet. With the world's reality so unstable, once he struck, the world would shatter without almost any resistance.

And so... he made his move. In an instant, he released all limitations on the power of his lance. Roaring outward in all directions, it spread like a giant, scarlet pair of wings, one that, were it ever to beat downward, would likely have been able to encircle the whole the world. With the sun's light shining down upon his back only to be consumed, Borogove let his power run wild without limits, spreading it across the entirety of the heavens before he would bring it all crashing down upon the earth.

The world below trembled and shook as the antithesis of both existence and divinity was made manifest, encircling the planet and beginning to press down on it. Although all of this took place in a single instant, perhaps some aspect of the giant, connected as he was to Gaia, might realize what was occurring only after it had happened. The world that sustained Goliath was beginning to cry out in terror. In the next instant, the archer would silence that voice. Gaia screamed in pain as scarlet energy, too powerful for even Borogove to control, began to seep down from his wings of light, concentrating onto a single point. The ground beneath Goliath's feet cracked apart as a single, gigantic symbol began to spread across the entire planet, with him standing right as its very center: a cross.

Then, with all his might, Borogove brought back the lance. In that moment, reality shuddered as the wings of power surrounding him collapsed upon the weapon itself, encasing it in an overwhelming, world-shattering vermillion light. Giving a cry of exertion, Borogove let loose the weapon, casting it down, down, down. Like a scarlet meteor, it fell upon the earth, aimed straight for one point: the giant himself. Everything between it and him, and then the entire earth below his feet, were now perfectly aligned, a single target for Borogove's planet-crushing attack. The lance reached the top of the divine cloud, and ripples of gold spread out like the aftershock of a pebble atop a pond, spreading across the sky as the weapon momentarily halted in its path, the god Ouranus' existence trying to resist its power. It was ironic, the archer mused, watching his attack halt in its tracks. By attempting to block his javelin unconsciously... that god had just doomed both itself and the entire world over which it hovered.

Then... the lance began to spin. In an instant, the whirling ripples had accelerated like a hurricane, spiraling outward in all directions as the spear pressed down upon the god's existence. Across the entire surface of the planet, the combined boundaries of three gods' souls all spread in a futile attempt to save themselves. But this attempt was useless. From the moment the Lance of Longinus had connected with their essence, its special property had become active: The power to pierce through any divine defense, and to eradicate any god whose existence it struck. By channeling Gaia's energy, the giant had given Borogove a point to strike. By attempting to protect itself, Ouranus had made sure that his attack would connect without fail. By trying in vain to hold up the falling sky, Atlas had provided the perfect conduit for the lance to travel down, straight toward its target: the giant, and then, Gaia herself. Vermillion light flashed throughout the heavens as, warping into a single, twisting point, the Lance of Longinus pressed against the god's defensive field. The sky began to bulge downward as the rippling field slowly gave way. Then, in an instant... the field shattered.

A wave of power spread across the planet in an instant, space rippling outward into a black void. The surface of the planet began to be ripped free from its core and rose into the air, only to be disintegrated by a tremendous wave of scarlet. Ouranus did not even have time to cry out before he collapsed upon himself as though a black hole had been created at his core. In actuality, his existence had simply been erased from reality on all levels, the physical, the metaphysical, and the spiritual. Next was Atlas, whose mighty arm crumbled in an instant. And then, at ground zero of the impact was Goliath himself. His soul already destroyed, his body was turned instantly into pure nothingness without resistance. And even still, the lance did not stop. No, it plunged downward, carving into the very earth. Gaia screamed her last as the scarlet cross that now encircled the planet abruptly collapsed inward as the Lance reached her very heart.

And then, in a tremendous flash of light... The planet, the atmosphere, and a large part of the space around it collapsed into a gaping void, imploding in a brief glare the light of which dwarfed that of the very sun. And when the light faded, there was nothing left, in the purest sense of the term. All reality within that segment of space had been eradicated in the death throes of its guardian deity. The only thing left was Borogove, who floated alone in the darkness of the void. The last remnants of his protective shield sustaining him long enough for the world to begin resetting beneath him, logging him out in time to save his life.

How fortunate. If he hadn't brought the spirit of that planet out for me to eliminate with the lance, I might have been hard-pressed to defeat him. Foolish, expecting to defeat me with a god. False gods such as these are one thing I can eliminate without fail. Still, there's no sense in letting divine power like this go to waste. Perhaps this battle was profitable enough after all? With these thoughts, Borogove looked down, flexing his newly-restored left arm by reaching out with it... and grasping the handle of a new sword, the last remnant of the celestial power of the giant and his gods. It was greatly weakened by the destruction of its source, but, on the other hand, it would suffice as the first of many weapons Borogove would employ time and time again...

(New loot: +1 sword. Will update information into bio soon. Good fight, Victin! This was possibly the most fun I've had writing a battle with another player in years! =D)

"The Apocalypse is basically just a tutorial." - Sicon112.

"Due to the ambiguity of this wording, I am unable to determine whether or not I am the leader of the X-Men!" "UNIVERSE-BREAKING EPILEPSY RAVE!" - AMimsyBorogove